


Blue Motherf*cker

by Niji_Hitomi_Iscariot, Silver_Eternity



Series: Gang Wars of Las Noches [2]
Category: Bleach
Genre: Alcohol, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Biker AU, Character Death, Explicit Language, Gangs, Grief/Mourning, Gun Violence, Multi, Recreational Drug Use
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-09-13
Updated: 2016-09-19
Packaged: 2018-08-14 20:05:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 4,337
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/8027197
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Niji_Hitomi_Iscariot/pseuds/Niji_Hitomi_Iscariot, https://archiveofourown.org/users/Silver_Eternity/pseuds/Silver_Eternity
Summary: Revenge ten years in the making, the Espada have fallen, the No Kill Rule no longer applies, and the King rides into battle... someone's going to die.





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> This is one I've been sitting on for literally years. Finally gave it a good polish and decided y'all should enjoy it. >;3c

_ “Show me! Show me to all of Las Noches; the father killer, the Motherfucker!” _

A sigh. Blink up at the ceiling and try to remember  _ not  _ to remember. Scrub a hand over an eye to get the sand out. Roll out of bed. Plant the feet. Steady steps. That's it. Heh, sunshine. He hated sunshine. Except on those lazy afternoons when he'd prop his feet up on the patio table with a book across his stomach and sleep like the feline he was. Pantera. The mighty jaguar of the urban jungle. The Sexta. Heh.

Fuck.

Thinking about him now. Guess step number two got skipped this morning.

Ten years.

Same routine.

Ichigo pushed the gauzy curtain back from the window over the sink and measured the coffee into the pot. He shook his head, and tried to clear the thoughts of the wild blue-haired man that had been the center of his universe for so long. The date on the calendar stood out at him like a laser, boring into his brain even when he wasn't looking at it. He sighed again.

"Morning." He spoke aloud to the empty kitchen. "No nightmares last night. That's good, right? Was cold without you though."

Shaking his head again, he slammed the button on the coffee maker just as the doorbell rang. He glared, crossed through the expansive house, and peered out of the peephole in the door. Opening it he scowled at the short, dark-haired man standing on his front porch.

“You’re early.”

There stood Ulquiorra, and he came bearing a gift like the intelligent man he was. Cradled in one arm was a bottle of turquoise alcohol with what looked suspiciously like marijuana leaves in it. It had been a special, secret recipe he’d been taught and forbidden from sharing. However, he brewed a bottle for Ichigo every year. They had both been close to the blue motherfucker who’d invented it, and they frankly needed the help to get through this day.

"Who is she?"

The redhead glared darkly at the auburn-haired woman standing directly behind the man his husband had called brother. For her part, the girl looked half terrified, half apologetic, but it did nothing to sway Ichigo's opinion of having the stranger on his front stoop. Then, she was stupid.

"Hi, I'm Orihime!" She stuck out her hand and he raised an eyebrow at it. "I wanted to meet you because Ulqui always talks about you."

The eyebrow was then aimed at Ulquiorra.

The smaller man took her hand and held it. "She is my woman." The words 'most’ and ‘recent' were left unsaid. "I know you prefer to be sociable, Orihime, but this is a very sad day and I doubt Ichigo-san wishes to socialize."

"You brought a bitch to  _ my _ doorstep?" The redhead blinked, eyebrow still firmly in place.

For a moment it seemed as though he was going to say more, and the atmosphere among the three grew heavy. But just as Orihime was about to squeak out something else, the taller man stepped back through the door, leaving it open so the other two could enter the house.

He led them into the living room, where a plush couch and two equally plush arm chairs framed a low table and an expensive looking television was hung on the wall. There were bookshelves off to the side, surrounding a bay window in an obvious bibliophile's corner with tall, broad panes of glass that filtered in the sunlight like liquid gold. In that area were two high-backed reading chairs. One was well-used, with slightly frayed seams and an air of comfort. The other was covered in a fine layer of dust so thick that the indigo upholstery was grey by comparison. Scattered around the room were lamps and end tables with the remnants of other books on almost all of them. At the opposite end from the bookshelves, next to the doorway through which they'd entered, a small shrine was set up. No picture, but a rosebush sat in a small pot with a single blossom on it in the brightest turquoise ever grown. Today it had a stick of incense in front of it, and a pair of pillar candles.

Ichigo was just blowing out the match from lighting all three when Orihime opened her mouth for a second time.

"Wow! Your place is so nice! And so many books!"

The redhead appeared to give a small twitch, but said nothing, crossing the room to the end table next to a chair. He withdrew two high-ball glasses and set them on the coffee table expectantly

Ulquiorra uncorked the bottle. "She insisted on coming along in case I should require emotional support," he muttered under his breath to the other man as he began to pour and mix the way the blue motherfucker had taught him so long ago. "Give her something shiny to amuse herself with in another room or send her home if you wish. She tends to mean well, but… she is anything but the brightest color in the paint set."

"I see." Ichigo took his seat in one of the arm chairs, also fairly well-worn, but not as badly as the one in the window, and raised his glass admiring the color. "So, how are things?"

Orihime tried not to react to the way the two men spoke about her as though she wasn't there. That was the way things were done with her boyfriend and she just had to accept that if she wanted to keep him. So, she took a seat at the other end of the couch, and really did attempt to be good. She just didn't do sitting around simply talking all that often.

Ulquiorra didn't say it to be mean. If he had he would have spoken at full volume, as he did now. "Things have been… stressful. But with matters being the way they have been since the motherfucker left us, that is nothing new. How have things been with you?"

Ichigo simply shrugged, watching.

The dark-haired man had stress lines around his eyes and mouth, a deeper curve to the set of his eyebrows and though his skin was a decent pink for a change, there was a sunken-ness about his cheeks that spoke volumes about just how stressful things had been. Then he shifted his gaze to the woman. She was looking around, her foot tapping, and trying desperately not to sigh in boredom. Please let her not be who he was afraid she was. His heavy amber gaze jumped back to meet the emerald watching him, and, he knew, analyzing him as thoroughly as he had been a moment before. A few grey hairs at the temple, maybe an inch of skin that hadn't been there ten years ago, but nothing had really changed since everything had.

"Yes." He cleared his throat, and took a sip of his drink. "Well… you know."

The woman shifted again, her foot sliding along the floor, and his eyes jumped back to her with a subtle twitch of his brows.

"Yes."

Ulquiorra admittedly hoped that Ichigo wouldn't notice those details, but truly had expected he would. The man had never stopped being observant, despite the few strands of silver peppering his orange mane and the new frown lines around his face and eyes that Ulquiorra had distinctly recalled starting as laugh lines. He wasn't so different… except for everything was different these past ten years. Sometimes, sometimes Ulquiorra hated the motherfucker. Hated him for leaving, in his prime, in Ichigo's prime, and leaving the orange-haired man withdrawn and inconsolable with anguish.

Ichigo closed his eyes, for a moment forgetting that there was someone else in the room with him, merely letting the alcohol wash over his tongue. Sweet, a hint of mint, and that burn! Slow, agonizing, like the way the blue motherfucker always treated him. How he'd run his tongue along his ear, dip his fingernails so sharp to be claws into the waistband of his jeans, press behind him with that heat that always radiated from his sun-kissed skin. Ichigo practically groaned out loud at the way the alcohol running down his throat mimicked that internal fire his other half had.

Then it was shattered.

Orihime, unable to simply occupy her mind with anything, asked, of all things, "So… how do you know Ulqui?"

The ginger's eyes flew open and he stared at her over his glass.

Ulquiorra wouldn't meet Ichigo's eyes, one finger tracing the rim of his already-half-empty glass. "Ichigo-san and I met roughly twenty-five or so years ago through a mutual friend… rather, my friend and his boyfriend at the time." He frowned into his glass and took another swig. "If I recall, when we first met we hated each other, didn't we, Ichigo-san?"

The taller man’s mouth curved slightly. "Yeah. You could say that. Of course, it wasn't my fault you felt threatened by me."

He sipped the alcohol again, but the magic was gone so he set the glass down on the table.

"Oh?" Orihime shifted slightly uncomfortable under the heavy, unwavering amber gaze.

"I did not feel threatened by him," Ulquiorra defended, a glint of amusement in his eye. "You commented I had a stick so far up my ass you could see it behind my teeth. I believe I called you gutter trash who’d been fucked by a camel."

Ichigo actually chuckled, a soft sound, like the brush of velvet over soft skin. "Oh, yeah." He took another drink. "I can still see that stick."

The brunet’s eyes danced in playful challenge as he clinked the ice in his own glass. "If you can still see the stick, then I must admit I can still see the hoof prints on your ass."

Orihime bit her lip and looked back and forth between them. "But, Ulqui… you said you were straight."

"I am, Orihime. Why would you assume otherwise?"

The girl completely deadpanned, blinking. "But then why would you have a stick up your ass?"

"Really?" Ichigo looked between the two, incredulous. " _ Really? _ "

The corner of Ulquiorra’s mouth twitched. "He is referring to what he calls my 'uptight' nature, by which he means the proper way in which I speak. And yes, Ichigo, really."

"Heh." Ichigo didn't comment any further on it, shaking his head. The girl was obviously below him in both intelligence and social grace.

Orihime blinked again. "But..." She was confused. She looked between the two, getting frustrated. "Ulqui, you said this was about… and… oh! I hate it when you talk over my head. Damnit, you do it at the club all the time. I'm not a know-nothing! I wouldn't be Queen if I was!"

This time Ichigo blinked, trying not to choke on his drink as his hopes were dashed. This was Head Bitch?! This was  _ his  _ successor!? 

He muttered, with another shake of his head. "You've got to be kidding me.”

"She is the woman of the senior officer, Ichigo," Ulquiorra said simply before addressing Orihime. "It is not so much that we are talking over you as we are simply talking about things you were not present for. As for at the club… I will explain at home. Now is not the time to speak of business. Now is a time to ruminate on times long gone."

"No, please," Ichigo sat back and crossed his legs. "tell me, how  _ are _ things at the club?"

"Things are..." Ulquiorra's hesitation was only perhaps a second longer than his usual pause, but it was enough for the likes of Ichigo to notice. "Busy. Very busy. But it is not the same. It has never been quite the same since  _ he _ left us."

"I see." The ginger once again sipped his drink, but this time, his eyes burned over the rim.

Whatever was going through the man's mind, he wasn't about to share it. The silence stretched among them for a few minutes as he continued to stare them down. The atmosphere had completely changed. Orihime no longer felt like they were just visiting. It felt like… an interview, or maybe like they were reporting in to someone much higher than they were in status. She swallowed reflexively, a bead of sweat trailing down her neck for no apparent reason.

Ulquiorra poured himself a second drink. "Things have gone downhill in recent years, Ichigo. Without your motherfucker to keep things shipshape, people have slipped up. And I can only take care of so much, while they slip further and further all the time."

He carefully did not say anything directly while still making it quite obvious to Ichigo that the club was getting to such a point he was genuinely considering dissolving it.

Once again, Ichigo closed his eyes, relishing in the burn of the alcohol. "Then I guess it's time I said good bye."

Finishing the drink, he got up and walked out of the room, without even bothering to wait for an answer.

Orihime fish-mouthed for a moment. "I… Did… Ulqui! He just...!"

She wasn't sure what bothered her. The man's attitude toward her boyfriend, his nosey questions about  _ their  _ club—which was going fine as far as she was concerned—or the way he just walked away without even so much as seeing them to the door.

Ulquiorra finished his own drink and set down his glass. "Yes, I suppose he did. Come Orihime… not only is this his own home, this is the anniversary of the death of someone very dear to him. I take no offense to anything Ichigo does or says on this day. Let us go home." He took his woman's arm.

As soon as the front door closed, Ichigo, in the kitchen, sighed again. "They're gone."

He called into the silence of the house, not really expecting an answer, but he knew the only other living soul in the place would want to know. 

"And I think they need me."

"Ah think so too, King," came the silky, soft voice from the wall. "Qio looks worn down near raw an' fer th' Queen Bitch she sure dun know no etiquette. She ain' got nuthin' needed ta be Queen. Not even any attention span ta speak uv or any grace. Jus' a liddle cute charm, does more harm than good. Would be dif'ren' if she could pull out some serious, deadly side, but s'obvious she ain' capable."

Ichigo nodded, taking a drink from the coffee. He had a job to do later, and the alcohol and Mary Jane in his system needed to be at least hidden from his breath before that. A deep breath later, and he looked up at the shadowed doorway.

"Yeah. It's time we returned."


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Beta-read by my awesome moirail, Tsu!

A week later and everyone in the club had been gathered. The music from the new DJ blared from the dance floor that had replaced the pool tables. Those were in the basement where other, not-spoken-of things used to occur, along with a jukebox and a couple of other 'vanilla' arcade type games and couches. That was the Bitch Domain now. Lights upstairs flashed down through the door that used to be padlocked and sealed behind security, only accessible to the leader. Scattered around the tables that ringed the dance floor were the new members. Mostly low-lifes, drug-users and small-time criminals that had either bought their way in or been piggybacked on the current leader-elect. All in all what was once a respected and feared den was now a hole-in-the-wall filled with rats. But that was ok, because rats enjoyed the company of other rats.

Only the club's most senior member—Ulquiorra—was allowed to mourn their illustrious former Leader on the actual day. He was one of the few left who had truly known him. Others celebrated the fact that he had lived, and that he had run with them, tonight. They barely knew what they toasted to, but that was the way of things. All the old-timers were gone, in retirement or dead. Besides Ulquiorra, just the barkeep remained from the Glory Days, and they were quite somber amid the revelry.

There had been a toast to the Pantera, and then everyone else went back to what they were doing. At least, until the door banged open, throwing the light from outside into the darkened club. Silhouetted in the frame was another that remembered those Glory Days, but in a way more personal than either of the others. To the trash in the club he was a nobody, or rather, he was a non-existent person. He wasn’t real. Someone spoken of in hushed whispers and these days more often derided than feared. At least until he showed up.

Ulquiorra sat up immediately from where he had been slouched back against the bar, rising to his feet from a nearly-forgotten habit as he tipped his green-banded white fedora to his former Queen. Of all the times for Ichi to come and see how far they had fallen, he had to choose _tonight_. Of course. He should've known. Every club member was required to attend all mourning ceremonies, and when the King wanted to make a point, he wanted the biggest audience possible to learn from their mistakes.

"Greetings and welcome, fairest and fallen," he said in his quiet, respectful way—the traditional greeting for a powerful retired member.

It had been the motherfucker who came up with that, having read it in a book somewhere and liking the wording. Probably because of the well-read redhead in the doorway right now. The way the man had subtly walked into their lives and brought class, sophistication, even aristocracy to their previously gutter-born group of misfits; it was like magic. A sense of royalty that none had been able to question, even to this day.

Ulquiorra shook away those memories. "Our home is yours, as ever. To what do we owe the pleasure of your presence?" He came up to the door to escort Ichigo to the bar, where Chad was already assembling numerous ingredients for Ichi's favorite drink.

Ichigo said nothing, merely inclining his head by a fraction. He would have responded with the traditional greeting, but that had been wiped from his mind the second he'd had to wipe the pavement with the doorman. He turned to the side, looked at something no one inside the club could see, nodded again, and entered the darkened room proper. The door closed behind him and he waited for a moment. When nothing happened he crossed to the bar, letting the brunet trail behind him. Leaning against it with his elbows on the polished wood, he surveyed the gathered riffraff critically, and spoke for the first time.

"Blue Motherfucker."

Chad inclined his head, his bangs still hanging down over his expressive eyes, in spite of the streak of silver from his temple, but for that he looked identical to the way he had ten years before. His voice rumbled behind the retired King with the same intensity. "Heart on a pike?"

Ulquiorra frowned slightly to himself. So many codes, so many signs...he might be out of practice but he recognized them readily enough. It was especially unlike Ichigo to ignore any of the traditions set up by the man whose name had been exchanged for the drink he'd just ordered. What had happened that would make him discard protocol like that?

Among the rats, mutters and whispers began. Surely this strange fucker couldn't mean _the_ blue motherfucker. No, no, he just liked the drink. But Chad didn't fix people blue motherfuckers. And what did he mean ‘heart on a pike’? What was it? A garnish of some sort? That drink had no garnish! Orange hair, lanky frame, permanent scowl? Could this be…? No! He never showed his face anymore. All the stories said he’d disappeared after the death of the Pantera.

"Yes." Was all the burning-eyed man said. His expression was neutral but his eyes. Oh Gods, his eyes. Like amber steeped in fire and wrapped in liquid gold.

Dutifully Chad added it; a beautiful, plump, ripe strawberry at peak flavor, speared right through the middle, green removed, and then the tiny plastic sword laid across the glass horizontally. A perfect sweet treat just barely suspended above the toxic blue liquid.

Without lifting the drink, Ichigo reached out, plucked the sword from the glass, and cleanly bit the strawberry in half. Having swallowed the flesh of the fruit, he replaced the sword, the berry now hovering at least six centimeters from the liquid.

Ulquiorra promptly went white, and Chad began to unobtrusively pack up his alcohols and other paraphernalia. Whispers erupted again, louder. Ulquiorra? White? Gone _pale?_ That was something none of them had ever seen. Stuff from stories told by retired Shinigami who had seen him in battle. A white demon, one of a pair... and the only one they were _willing_ to talk about. They refused to even mention the other one. These two, and their infamous team, were why the Espada wore white leather.

"Qio..." Ichigo began in a soft, even, unassuming tone; _not_ touching the drink further.

Ulquiorra gave him his full attention—not that he didn't have it already—and showed it with a nod. He wanted to sit down, in fact shortly he would _need_ to sit down, but not yet. He had to keep showing his respect by standing to give the returned royalty the deference he deserved.

"Where is your Bitch, and why have I not been greeted?" The orangette looked down at the bar and rolled the sword gently from edge to edge, never letting the berry touch the glass.

"She is downstairs with the others... and for the record she is not my Bitch. She is my woman."

This statement pleased Orihime, when she heard it in her air-headed misconceptions, but Ichigo knew the proper translation: 'she comforts me at the moment; I wouldn't even consider her for more at this point.' Another bone of contention, Ulquiorra knew, was the fact that the Bitches were all downstairs. The bikers were the ones who were supposed to be hidden and taking care of the things in the shadows while the Bitches' job was supposed to be to run interference, play host, and keep up the 'everything is just fine and perfectly legal' cover up in the club.

The sword stopped. Every muscle in Ichigo's body froze. "Chad... the phone."

His head was bent, his bangs hiding his face. Not even a twitch of his other hand, still resting on the bar, as relaxed as before.

Ulquiorra swallowed hard as Chad took the phone on the wall in hand. "Protected line, or regular?"

The ginger gathered a bead of condensation from the glass and traced the kanji ‘卍’ on the bar with his finger. 

The bartender nodded. "Protected then." He had suspected that, and handed him the phone.

Ulquiorra's knees buckled and he sat down next to the King with a nearly inaudible whimper. A half-eaten strawberry AND a call on a protected line?! There was only one person he ever needed to call from the protected line.

Ichigo was still tracing the design on the bar what that familiar, silky voice carried over the line so clearly it could be easily heard even over the music that played much quieter in the background. "Maaah, ya called, mah King?"

"Bring it." Was his only reply, in somewhat cold, distant tones.

There was a chilling giggle that made people within earshot shudder and their hair stand on end. "Got it, King! Should I bring tha attachments?"

Ichigo drew the design again, "Yes, Horse."

A manic laugh erupted from the receiver. "So I get ta play too! Ohhh, I'll be righ' there King!" Then there was the click of disconnection.

What little color remaining in Ulquiorra’s face drained, leaving him the pale, pale white he had been during the Glory Days. His expression reminiscent of that time, caught between apology and distaste, as the pride and egotism slipped back into his veins like a drug he’d been without for far too long. An emerald eye slid across the trash littering the floor of _his_ club, and the fear that hovered at the back of his mind warred with an elated sadism stemming from the possibility of using skills he hadn’t been able to without his partner. His hand came up, the nails pitch-black as always, standing out as he pulled his hat down to hide his face. Between the death simmering in his eyes and the twitch of the corner of his mouth, he didn’t want to give away the King’s plans.

The ginger handed the phone back to Chad, and now, he took a sip of the blue alcohol, keeping his expression hidden from the gathered masses. The stoic bartender hung up the phone and as he was aware that he would no longer be needed after this point, he slipped out the back door, unnoticed. Around the room, murmurs of confusion, whispered snippets of old stories, and a few sneers of disbelief took the place of the music. The lights no longer flashed, and those who had been dancing either stood like statues where they had been or had made their way over to the tables to join their mates. In the basement, someone asked what happened to the music and Orihime frowned. She gave a half-spoken sentence about finding out and poked her nose out of the Bitch's Domain just as the door flew open again.

There stood the Original White Demon himself, grinning from ear to ear. Bloodlust and mischief sparkled in his gold eyes as he looked over the assembled riffraff. And he let the door bang behind him as he made his way inside, slinking between the tables and the bar, combat boots clunking on the floor. On his shoulder, he held what appeared to be a modified rocket launcher—pure white—his pride and joy, Zangetsu.


End file.
